It takes very little for things to turn upside down
by Pianoninja
Summary: Little Jacky Burrows was oblivious to what her Mum was apologising for. Until she found herself running down the street screaming her name.
1. Chapter 1

**Right okay so basically I spent last Friday shadowing a social worker! We spent the day in a few meetings and I spoke to one woman (I think she was a senior social work practitioner type person) anyway, we were talking about when young people are taken into emergency care, which got me thinking about my past and my own experiences. So basically I decided to write a fanfiction, this chapter is a lot more fiction that anything from my own life but it's quite possible the next chapter will be a bit more biographical (obviously with added drama.) **

**Hope you enjoy! **

**Oh p.s. I uploaded this especially for MirrorSparkles1234 because she sounds a bit glum. :) **

It was the year 1998 on a gloomy and wet November afternoon, the sun had already began to dip out of the sky leaving the neighbourhood slowly submerging into darkness, and a 12 year old Jacqueline Burrows had just walked through her front door. Little Jacky had always been an odd young girl, she was smarter than her peers which made them feel inferior to her and therefore gave them a reason to bully her. The school had bought her Mother in multiple times in a bid to try and understand why she had such a tough time making friends but with no such luck. Paula often wondered whether the lack of a Father figure contributed to it, or perhaps her isolated childhood without having any siblings to play with. To be truly honest though, Paula Burrow's had always felt detached from her daughter, they had nothing in common and although deep down she loved her, there was something in her mind that told her this would be the best thing for the pre-teen.

Jacky kicked her soggy shoes off in the hall way, flung her dripping coat on a hook and began to make her way quickly up the stairs. She heard a familiar but softened voice call quietly from the kitchen,  
"Jacky love, come in here please..." The fiery haired twelve year old sighed and stomped back down stairs into the kitchen where her mother sat at the table with a cup of tea. In the corner of the room she set her eyes on two suitcases, before flicking her emerald eyes back to focus on her Mum. "Sit down a minute love." She nodded her head towards the empty wooden chair across the table from her and pained a smile at her young daughter. The young girl sat down at the table with a puzzled expression  
"What's going on Mum?" She queried with a sense of childish innocence and naivety.

Just a week ago Paula Burrows only daughter was due to turn twelve, as usual she tried to get to have a party but Jacky being Jacky refused, saying "I don't want to invite anyone over, they're all imbeciles!" This in turn broke down into the usual screaming match between mother and daughter, leaving Jack crying upstairs into a book while Paula drowned her sorrows in a bottle of supermarket vodka. Unfortunately at that moment the young mum looked to the house phone on the wall. This took her mind back to a conversation she had with a male acquaintance just a few days before.

"_Heeeey Pauly B, Dale here, how's it going? Listen, sorry I didn't get back to you after our date the other day, I've been kinda busy."  
"Oh hi Dale, um yeah I'm good, that's fine don't worry about it." Paula had been introduced to Dale by an old friend recently, and although they'd only been on one date, she felt something special with him.  
"Yeah so anyway, I'm gunna cut to the chase, I've got a little proposition for you."  
"Oh right, um what is it?"  
"Well see the thing is, I've been offered a job in India...and I'm going to take it."  
"Oh...well yeah that's cool, I mean um..it's early, I mean..y'know..."  
"Wait a sec, just let me finish Paula. I...want you to come with me." There was a long period of silence between the pair as she processed what had just been said, "Paul'?"  
"No. I mean, I'm sorry Dale, I've got a daughter." and with that she hung up, not expecting to hear from him again._

She stood in the kitchen, leaning against the sink, staring at the phone and cradling the bottle of vodka. 'I can't. Can I? Maybe it would be best...she'd be better off without me...' She thought to herself through a mind clouded by the tingle of alcohol and emotion before picking up the phone and dialling his number.  
_"Yello"  
"Uh hi Dale it's me, Paula." Her voice cracked a little as she spoke, making the young man's mind rush with concern.  
"Oh hey, you alright?"  
"Um yeah..well no, um listen, I've been thinking, I want to come to India with you."  
There was a familiar silence between the pair again, this time as her contemplated this revelation.  
"What? Are you sure? What about your daughter?" Paula sighed hopelessly as a tear fell down her cheek.  
"She'll be better off without me." He though it best not to question, after all he was getting what he wanted, a beautiful young woman to come with him to India.  
"Right well, we leave next Friday."  
"Okay, just let me sort some stuff out yeah? and I'll get back to you." With that she hung up the phone once again and set about sobering herself up before searching for the number of the office of the social services for the area._

Back in the present day and Paula Burrows sat at the dark wooden table, studying her daughter's shining auburn hair and young face, even at this age she could tell she was going to be stunning. Earlier that morning she had received a phone call from a Natalie Patel from the duty social work team in Bristol, finalising the plans for later that afternoon and giving the stranger all the details of her young daughter. Her daughter was still staring at her Mum across the table, confused and concerned, the query about the suitcases behind her in the forefront of her mind.  
"Mum?" She prompted the sad woman to give her some sort of explanation.  
"Oh god. Jacky, I love you so much, you know that right? Paula sniffed a little as she spoke to her innocent little girl, she couldn't bare to be hurting her this much, but she knew it was for the best. "I just want you to know I'm-" her anxious confession was interrupted by a loud knock at the door. With a heavy sigh Paula heaved herself out of the chair, leaving her cold cup of tea, and opened the door. Jacky heard the unknown voice in her hallway.  
"Hello Miss Burrows. Is she ready?" Paula couldn't bare to speak to the snooty professional so she beckoned her to follow, and lead her into the kitchen.

"Mum? What's going on?" Jacky climbed down from the kitchen table and stood in the doorway, her green eyes glistening. "Who's that?" She looked towards the strange woman behind her mum.  
"I'm sorry Jacky." Miss Burrows kissed her confused daughter and slid past her towards the two black suitcases. Jacky turned and faced her Mum with tears brimming in her eyes,  
"Sorry for what?" He voice crumpled into a heart breaking whisper, "Mum please, what's going on?" The torrent of tears began to run down her pale young face, Paula refused to look at the young girl as she escaped out the back door with her things, muttering painfully under her breath,  
"Goodbye my sweet." She struggled down the path without turning to look back, Ms Patel called down the drive after her, exasperated and annoyed,  
"Miss Burrows! Come back, you can't just leave!" Without the energy to give a second thought the woman climbed into the red ford escort, shot it into gear and rushed off the drive. Jacky came to a sudden realisation as she ran out onto the drive and tried to run down the road. The less that sympathetic social worker grabbed her by the arm as she cried,  
"Mum! Mum! MUM COME BACK!"


	2. Chapter 2

**So it's safe to say I got a little carried away with describing things again (no change really.) Anyway, I hope it's not too much and you enjoy it! Leave me a review and let me know what you think! Xx **

Little Jacky got in the stranger's black corsa with very little fuss. She figured that there was no point in running, after all she had nowhere and nobody to run to, this social worker seemed to be the only one that wanted to look after her...for now at least. The car smelt distinctly of aniseed sweets and the woman's expensive perfume. Natalie was a young woman, she had dark hair and tanned skin, she had deep bags under her eyes and the beginnings of a set of frown lines forming in her face. She looked fed up and almost traumatised, she was over worked and buried under a case load fit for at least three people. She had obviously seen some things that nobody should, she had seen young children left orphaned by heroin addicts, parents breaking their hearts over giving their children up because they couldn't look after them, and here was Miss Burrows abandoning her beautiful and smart young daughter for a fling in a foreign country with a man she barely knew.

As the pair sat in the car Ms Patel dug her way through hoards of paperwork on the back seat of her car to pull out a map. She flicked to the back of her leather bound diary and and pulled out a small slip of lined paper with an address on it.  
"Right Jacky, I'm going to be taking you to stay with a foster family...just the other side of Bristol. Okay?" Even she knew the child was being completely uprooted from everyone and everything she knew but it couldn't be helped, emergency foster placements were so scarce that this was all they could muster in the short space of time.

For the first time since they had got into the strangely scented car little Jacky turned her head to look at the map with tears in her eyes. This time it was different, not tears of sadness but tears of pure fear as she contemplated her future. 'What's going to happen to me? Am I going to see my Mum again? Where am I going to go to school? What if they don't let me be a doctor?' Her twelve year old mind was a whirlwind of questions and confusion, her thoughts only being broke by the shrill sound of the engine being bought into gear and the car slowly ushered off the driveway.

The journey seemed to take forever but it wasn't long enough. After sitting in silence for a whole Natalie began to speak, in a very patronising fashion,  
"So Jacky, do you know why some people decide to foster children?" What the hell? Why was she asking her this? All she wanted to do was curl up with her emotions like he usually did when something big was happening. However, this woman was the one looking after her at that moment, she decided to humour her. She replied in a timid little squeak, unsure of her answer  
"...because they can't have their own children?" The social worker let out a small chuckle, she was obviously laughing at her innocence.  
"Actually Jacky you may be surprised to know, the majority of foster carers do have their own children." Jacky raised her eyebrows, almost sarcastically, as she glared out the window. "In fact, a lot of them do it to help young people who are less fortunate in life." The young girl felt a chill down her spine, she mumbles under her breath  
"I don't need help. I may have been landed with an unfortunate choice for a mother, but I am not unfortunate." Ms Patel made a swift decision to end the conversation there before a full blown tantrum broke out in her car...she had been there before.

After a lot of driving around in circles, and a stop to ask a near by farmer for directions the car made it's way down a tiny pathway off the side of a lane and onto a huge driveway. The first thing Jacky noticed was the old roaming caravan parked on the edge of the pebbled driveway. The front door swung open to reveal a monstrous beast of a women behind it. She had white blonde hair which flicked up a little as it curled round her highly held head and bounced off her broad shoulders. As her gaze travelled down her rounded body a drizzle of light bounced of a sparkling peal necklace which was clipped precariously around her chunky neck. She was wearing a long black dress which failed in hiding the folds where her body rolled and undulated in all the wrong places. She took a step forward in a black pair of healed brogues and stood just in front of the doorway.

Jacky stepped out of the car cautiously and stood surprisingly close to Natalie in an attempt to avoid the woman's steely glare.  
"Ah Mrs Vanderbilt good evening" the social worker greeted her in a welcoming tone, "this is Jacqueline." She gestured towards the young redhead who pained a pathetic smile and considered the reasoning behind the use of her full name. The woman stepped forward once again with a curious expression, she looked down on the twelve year old and lifted up one over sized chubby like hand. She stuck out a solitary sausage-like finger and poked it under the young girls chin, lifting her head high in the air and inspected her petite face.  
"Hm." She removed her finger and stepped back, still looking over young Jacky, she spoke loud voice with a questionable Dutch accent. "Scrawny one isn't she." Jacky resisted the urge to raise we eyebrows and give this rude woman a piece of her mind. "Ve shall make un Vanderbilt out of you...may have to dye ze hair though." Natalie and the Dutch woman shared a polite but worrying chuckle before she turned round and gestured for the pair to enter.

On entering the house the pair were lead through a to a large kitchen. They were invited to sit down at a large oak table with eight tall chairs around it. On looking round the room Jacky first saw the huge red range cooker, then the contrasting dark brown work tops and wooden cupboards.  
"You would like a drink?" Jacky winces at the woman's misuse of the English language but shook her head in rejection.

Then she was gone and little Jacky burrows was left stood alone in a strange room in a strange house with a posh Dutch woman planning to dye her auburn hair who knows what shade of blonde and fatten her up like a Christmas Turkey. Just a few hours ago she had been sat in a maths lesson completing algebraic equations to a standard much higher than her peers as she planned to go home to her Mum and finish the end of Charles Dicken's 'Great Expectations.' Now she had been abandoned by the one person she thought she could count on to always be there for her. As she sat down on the lumpy mattress which was now apparently hers she crossed her legs and took a deep breath and tried to hold the tears in. In her mind Mrs Vanderbilt didn't seem like the kind of woman who would accept weakness and tears. So from that moment she found a way to keep her emotions locked in and hide them from everyone whether they cared or not.

**By the way, just thought i'd mention, that the Mrs Vanderbilt character is modelled around my Spanish teacher so she's likely to be bit weird (although my teacher doesn't actually have the accent, I just decided the character needed it) Hope you enjoyed! **


	3. Chapter 3

**Howdy friends, sorry it's been a while, coursework seend to have taken over my life. Anyway, I don't whether this is any good as I've wrote it in bits here and there and the last I just wrote (it's not 01:48 on Tuesday morning, happy Holby day!) instead of sleeping, but I hope you enjoy it nonetheless. **

Six o'clock on a warm summer morning in 2013 and Jac Naylor lay awake in her spacious double bed, staring up at the ceiling contemplating her next course of action. She wasn't sure whether the cause of her insomnia was the baffling combination of thoughts and memories whirling around her head or the unsettling feeling of nausea floating in the depths of her stomach and rising to the back of her throat. She took a quick glance over at the sleeping form of her boyfriend before slowly and quietly making her way out of bed and gliding into the bathroom. After a long, hot shower she emerged with her wet hair dripping silently down her back, and picked up a fluffy white towel off the radiator. As she wrapped the cloth round her damp body and dried herself slowly she stopped for just a moment. Her eyes fell cautiously onto the small scar on her left hip, the imperfection against her pale skin bought with it a succession of raw and painful memories which on every occasion she did her best to forget. She took just a moment to let time continue around her as she gently traced the mark on her side with a sole distinct finger.

However, she was quickly brought out of her trance by a loud knocking on the door and a sleepy sounding Jonny mumbling through the wood  
"Hurry up will you, I need to take a leak!" The consultant rolled her eyes lightly as the corners of her mouth upturned slightly, before re-wrapping the soft towel around her and strolling past her boyfriend and back into the bedroom.

Just moments later as the Scot exited the bathroom a pale looking Jac hurried back past him and slammed the wooden door with sudden force.  
"Jac?" He called out in a confused tone, "you ok?"  
Meanwhile, she hovered weakly over the toilet breathing deeply as the unsettling feeling in her stomach seemed to die back down. In a quick but faint whisper she replied  
"Fine." and flushed away all evidence of events from moments ago before moving slowly over to the sink unit and splashing her face with cool water a few times as she began to return back to her normal, less sickly pallor.

Jonny reluctantly turned away from the bathroom, sensing his girlfriend wanted to be alone, and headed towards the bedroom to get dressed. She entered moments later, still slightly whiter than normal, and flicked the blues switch on the straightening irons before sitting down slowly on the padded stool in front of the wooden dresser. The pair stayed silent for a while, each waiting for the other to speak. Eventually, he chose to utter the first words, softly he queried,  
"You feeling alright?" She rolled her eyes in the usual fashion and quickly retorted  
"Fine." Without so much as a glance at him. He raised an eyebrow at her back and cautiously continued,  
"So...what was that about?" She sighed as she spun around and placed her hands firmly on her knees. Also with an eyebrow raised, mirroring him, she feigned naivety,  
"What?" She snapped.  
"You know what Jac! You just threw up and you don't expect me to be slightly concerned?" She closed her eyes and tensed up slightly noticeably as his raised voice echoed around her and shook her aching head. Without the energy to argue she attempted to brush him off quickly with a simple white lie,  
"It's nothing, Probably just something I ate." and turned back around to style her long auburn hair. However, refusing to settle for her usual 'Naylor-like' defence mechanisms, he stormed up behind her and placed a strong hand on her shoulder, turning her body to face him.  
"We are the same thing last night" he paused for a moment to watch her reaction, "and I know you didn't eat anything else all day." As suspected he noticed her facial expression change slightly as chastised herself for her failure to think through her cover up. "What's going on Jac?" He was determined and at this point she knew she'd have to tell him something. She placed the hot irons back down on the desk in front of her and turned to face him properly,  
"There's um...there's a chance that..." The nurse watched her nervously as she stuttered, and came to a sudden realisation. Without a second thought he blurted it out,  
"Are you pregnant!?" She bit her lip nervously as he stared into her glittering emerald eyes, with a short sharp breath and a nod she replied,  
"There is a possibility."

A few hours later on Darwin ward and once again the pale consultant emerges from the toilets looking considerably worse for ware. Mo, being the 'observant' (nosy) registrar she is, followed the red head with her dark eyes and a look of intrigue.  
"What are you looking at?" She snapped at doctor. The quick witted young Mo soon replied,  
"I'm not sure...you tell me" Jac narrowed her eyes,  
"What are you talking about Maureen!?" Mo rolled her eyes and spun round on her chair as the consultant sat down opposite her.  
"You know what I mean Jac. I've watched you going in an out of those toilets all morning...what's going on?" Flicking through a patient's notes in an attempt to detract from the awkwardness of the situation, she hissed back at the registrar,  
"What on earth does me going to the toilet have to do with you?" Mo couldn't help but smile at her avoidance tactics.  
"Jac..."  
"Don't call me Jac!" She snapped back at her colleague before matching off to her office. Mo sighed as she turned back around to continue working, 'hmm, how can I work this out?' She pondered to herself.

**So, yeah...I should update the rest of my fics soon (what with it being Christmas and me doing everything I can to ignore it) and I might even update this one again, we'll see how it goes eh? Anyways, if I don't have contact with any of you fabulous readers before then; I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and prosperous New Year! That's all, I'll shut up and go to sleep now, night. X **


End file.
